I left Tenpony and Manehattan behind the very next morning. I had this silly idea that if I left and walked south towards Fillydelphia, she’d meet up with me on the road. Yes, I’d made a mistake, but she had to know that I wasn’t entirely at fault. She never told me I couldn’t take ponies to see her, and she’d loved performing in the other towns!
Of course, I should have realized that if she was avoiding a place due to being recognized, that would extend to the ponies living there, too.
We were both at fault, and the damage had been done, as far as Wander knew. Homage couldn’t out her, and Wander didn’t use her Pipbuck much these days. She wouldn’t be listening to the news. She’d have no idea that all ‘DJ Pon3’ talked about that night was The Machine.
"Ladies and Gentleponies, Fillies and Colts of all ages, everypony not living under a rock, and everypony who can hear me under those rocks, we have a big bucking deal to talk about. That’s right, I swore. On the air. That’s how big a deal this is.
“Everyone recall that astonishingly curvy ball of righteous robot recycling, The Machine? Well, she payed yours truly a little visit, and I must say, ‘Ya Mashina,’ whatever that means! The rumors are true! The Machine really is just a mail-mare. She came to Tenpony with a letter, a package, and left with a certain DJ’s heart to continue her rounds. Don’t look at me like that. You know Pip and I are open, and let me tell you, The Machine has flanks for days!
“We need to talk about exactly what our friendly neighborhood mail-mare was delivering, but first, at her request, if any of you see the ghoul known as the Wanderer, please send her towards Fillydelphia, and tell her my assistant, who totally isn't me, has no, bucking, idea who she is. She’ll know what that means, and why I had to swear again, my good ponies.
“As for what The Machine’s delivering, the answer, is a future for us all! No, you didn’t mishear me. If you’ve ever been up north, you’ve seen the Spur Mountains. Big. Huge. Big-huge. Covered in ice, and lots of it. Turns out, there’s a whole nation on the other side of them, a Kingdom called Lith.
“They’ve just now found a way to cross the mountains safely, and are looking to trade. What do they have? Power, and the means to generate it.”
I’d bought a small wind-up radio before leaving Tenpony so that I could stay in contact with Homage. Sure, I could have talked back if I gave her my internal radio’s frequency, but I wasn’t about to do that. Not unless we became close, instead of just two ponies who liked each other.
I already hear more than enough voices in my head, what with my overactive imagination and all.
"I admit, I could use some company in here.”
My head isn’t empty, dad!
"Actually, sweetie, it is.” Dad chuckled.
I had no counterpoint to that, so I just kept walking.
The route Homage marked for me was an older country highway. One of the long windy, meandering ones built by private enterprises, before the Inter-Dutchy Highway network was completed. In spite of its Wander wandering, it was the most direct intact route between Filly and Tenpony. Given that they were the NCR’s two most populous settlements, and there was a road from Filly right to Canterlot, and from Canterlot to the NCR capital in Junction Town, this seemed like the best route to take.
As I walked down the crumbling, cracked, and buckling road, I realized that my fears about traveling alone in the Heartlands were silly. Sure, there was the risk from bandits, but the Gardens of Equestria had stripped away every threat I’d imagined from my youth. I remembered the pools of radioactive slime, how every shadow was crawling with some fresh horrific monstrosity, and that every other half-decent spot for a camp was filled with desperate ponies who were a coin’s toss away from deciding your life was worth a belly full of warm meat.
I made good time on my own, for a sick ‘zeeb’. The old highway signs were mostly intact enough to be readable. I could see the signs for Applewood ticking by, starting from 120 km. Based on the position of the sun, I was making a half decent 14 km/h or so with my careful jog. Even as damaged as I was, I could hold this pace, and it would mean I’d reach Applewood in about 8 hours.
Unfortunately, walking on my own through unfamiliar territory was still a pretty unsettling experience. I fell back onto my old technique of memorizing landmarks to help me keep an eye out, and also, so I’d remember the route forever. Just in case I had to run it again. Or, well, jog it again, since distance running was out of the question for now.
The first thing I made special note of was a pile up of eight cargo wagons. Big ones, the kind used to transport an entire farm’s worth of groceries. Most of them were burnt out, all of them had holes in them and only one of them had readable paint on the side. Ditzy Doo Deliveries.
I made a note of that. I was pretty sure that had been the name of the ghoul Tenpony would let in. Odds are pretty good her shipping company survived the war in some form. She might be behind the major caravan routes. I would have to tell Her Majesty about her next time we talked.
There was a train track running parallel to the old road. I took no note of it, until I saw that somepony had made a fort out of a train which had derailed long ago. The fort was little more than an armored section of a few cars with catwalks on top and some earthwork fortifications, but somepony had once tried to make a stand here. Recently, too.
When I took a look inside the train, I found the rotting bodies. I thought they were ghouls, at first, but they remained where they lay. They had been caravaners, that much was proven by their clothes, and the way the fort’s interior had been gutted and replaced with a lot of old beds. This place had been a rest stop not too long ago.
I wondered who’d attacked it while checking to see if they had left behind anything I could use. It felt a bit wrong to take things from a place which likely ran on a “take something leave something” policy when I had nothing to leave… But on the other hoof I really wanted that smoke grenade, and the coil of nylon rope.
I had no idea how the attackers had overlooked them when there was so little else of value left in the fort.
A long ways south from the fort I stumbled across an old roadside diner. One of the fancy ones which had at one point had the chrome trim and wainscoting. Now it was little more than a burnt out shell with a caved in roof, two centuries of water damage, and a parking lot full of old auto-wagons which had been thoroughly scrapped, leaving behind only the worthless sheet metal which had rusted to a thin layer of dust held in shape by pure force of will.
While not as memorable as other landmarks I added to the list, its sign was still very much visible from a long ways away: Ruby Collar’s Hayfries For Days. I’d seen the sign nearly two kilometers away thanks to its sheer size. Well, not the text portion. I’d seen the ancient fiberglass pegasus mare which stood nearly 4 meters tall, and was holding aloft a plate of hamburgers and fries as if receiving a gift from the heavens… Or giving a gift to the heavens.
While very old, weathered, riddled with holes, and in need of new paint, the sign was still very impressive.
Ruby must have been pretty ambitious about her restaurant. I was sad Ruby wasn’t around because I wanted to obey the sign and ask her about their new oatmeal-battered fries and their signature “Twilight size lunch platter.”
Had Ruby meant sized for Twilight, or the size of Twilight? The world would never know…
"Oatmeal, are they crazy?”
Next on my list of landmarks was perhaps, the strangest mundane thing I had ever seen in my life. A pile of auto-wagons, artfully arranged into a series of square arches to form a circle along the side of the road. Almost like the framework for a building. Sometimes, seemingly randomly, a single wagon would be buried halfway into the soil, the headlamps pointing skywards.
How? Why? I had no idea. But it was unmistakable as a thing to use for directions.
A good way after Wagonhenge, I stumbled upon a crashed airship! I recognized it from the Equestrian Air Force Operations Manual I’d read a long time ago. It was, or at least had been, a Raptor-class dropship. The weird thing is it didn’t look 200 years old. It sure didn’t look like it had crashed today, or the day before, but it wasn’t nearly as decayed as everything else along the road.
Naturally, I checked it out. A naive part of me hoped that if I hooked it to my power core it might turn back on and I’d have an airship to use for the rest of my route. Unfortunately, I never got to see if it would work. The first thing I discovered was that the ship’s clouds had been removed after the crash. Their pods were intact, but the access ports were open. Sabotage.
The ponies abroad had survived the crash, and made sure nopony else could use their ship. They’d also striped everything useful from the wreck, or somepony else had after them. Every useful bit of material had been taken. The ship was a shell.
A useful one for remembering how far you’d traveled, though!
As I exited the airship, I noticed another road sign.
Applewood 12 km
I squinted into the distance, hoping to see any sign of the town. Nothing. Not a thing. Just more of the endless rolling grassy hills which blurred together into one seamless pile of bleh. I mean, sure, grass was a nice change of pace. I liked green more than white. But, much like endless snowdrifts, endless grasslands all look the same.
I began to trot towards Applewood. There’s no way nopony had rebuilt a town right along the road they used to trade. I could probably pick up a few useful things. Tenpony wasn’t just for the snobby elites, it was for the RICH elites. My little radio had cost me 70 caps!
There was definitely things I’d forgotten to get while there, simply because I hadn’t wanted to debate what to buy when everything cost a leg and a leg! I just knew there had been something I wanted to get. It had been itching at the back of my mind since I gave Homage a goodbye kiss and—
And…
And I’d been so busy with the meeting and chatting with Homage till she fell asleep I'd forgotten to see if she wanted to buck!
I fell to my knees in the middle of the road, clamped my head in my hooves and screamed. “NOOOOOOOOOOOOO!”
I spun around and looked at the way I’d come. Eight hours. A long time… and I was on the clock…
I felt my left eye twitch. A few spikes of anger surged through my systems. “Katydid, your Majesty… If, when I get back to Tenpony, she’s not into me anymore, if that was my one and O̸҉NL͘͢Y̢̡͠ chance, then, by the Imperterritus's Cannons, by the Daughters of Roam, I shall be avenged!”
I turned, stamped my left-hind hoof as I was just a little absolutely livid with myself, and resumed walking to Applewood.
☢★★◯★★☢
Applewood had not been repopulated. It had no walls. I was upwind, and I couldn’t smell anypony, or any fires. Nor did I hear anypony talking, playing, or working. It was quiet. Dead silence.
I found that odd, since the town was oddly intact. I was able to walk right up to the edge of a bunch of old ranch-style houses. Before the war kicked off, a new style of home had become popular. Wood-panel walls, clay-tile roofs, large single-pane windows, and no exposed timbers. Neat, trim, tidy. Applewood had been built entirely in that style.
A whole town full of ‘new’ buildings, some of which had to be intact, given how little damage the town seemed to have taken, and they weren't using it at all.
Why?
The town’s abandonment set off alarm bells in my head. Something was wrong… Had the town been very heavily irradiated? Perhaps a dumping ground for toxic waste during the war? If so, that would have been cleared up by the gardens almost 15 years ago. Right?
So why not move in and at the very least salvage the tiles?
"Predators,” Imaginary dad remarked. "The only reason you’d see something like this is the place isn’t actually abandoned.”
But they use this road for trade... I said as I frowned and searched the ground around my hooves for any sign of wagon-ruts.
The road was dusty and muddy, and I’d seen plenty of wagon ruts and hoofprints in the dirt walking from Tenpony… but none went into town. In fact, I was about thirty meters from the closest set of tracks!
I backtracked immediately and turned to follow the tracks. A cart had come through recently. The wheel ruts were still sharp. It veered off east, off the road, to go around the town.
Ah, ha! Safe road, bad town. I’d found the safer path. Wander would be proud of me!
I still didn’t feel safe, so I drew my pistol and readied my LAER. Nothing was going to break my remaining hydraulic pump. Not if I had anything to say about it.
"You could just Machine Spirit your way into working properly. I’ve seen you do it plenty of times.”
You and I both know the last time I did that was more than seventy years ago. I’m so out of practice I’d probably break myself more while trying. I don't want to be a spirit, I want to be a zebra. Zebras can’t magic themselves into working better.
”That’s true… Keep it on the table as a last ditch effort to survive in spite of the risk, please.”
Well, yeah!
I began to follow the wagon ruts. They cut deeply through the slightly muddy earth, meaning the wagon was fully loaded. If a caravaneer was willing to take their cargo this close to the edge of town, it was probably safe. Whatever dangers lurked in Applewood must not approach the edge of town often.
I got the feeling that Applewood would have been a nice place to live before the war. The faded paint on each house was a nice cheerful color. Everypony who once lived within the town had once had a large yard. I could see the city streets were asphalt, not cobbled. A much nicer walking surface for certain!
There were even those nice street lamps which used crystal lamps. They stood above every street I could see between the buildings as I looked inwards, keeping an eye out for danger and admiring the spookily preserved pre-war ruin.
I was turning the corner around a fenced off yard containing a large Quonset hut when I saw the wagons. Three of them, each a crudely converted auto-wagon, just like the ones I saw leaving Two Bits. Aqua Cura wagons.
They were overturned, lying in a rough line where they had been knocked over, as an absolutely inconceivably numerous army of feral ghouls had swarmed them. Ghouls which even now where dining on the flesh of the poor caravaners… and the bottles upon bottles of irradiated water which they had been carrying.
I had exactly three processor cycles to take this all in before the ghouls turned towards me as one. As if the small army were in fact one singular creature composed of rotting flesh, pus-filled blisters, and exposed blackened, withering, bone.
Oh. Yes. That’s right. My core’s shielding is only 99.999% radiation proof. They sensed the radiation nearby. Strange, I knew for a matter of fact I put out a mere thousandth of what could be found in a single bottle of Aqua Cura.
Why would they even notice me? Oh well. Here comes a ghoul glomp. A bit gross, since they weren't a hoard of Wanders, but they’d forget about me eventually and I’d be on my—
"You’re covered in meat! They see radioactive meat Gears! RUN!” Dad screamed at me.
OH, SWEET CELESTIA, HE WAS RIGHT!!!
The ghouls began to screech. Hunting cries. I knew them well. I’d seen too many ponies running from packs of frostbitten ferals to not know that sound by heart.
They broke into a run, moving as a singular swarm. I couldn’t tell where one ghoul ended and another began.
There were too many to kill without explosives and formal training with such weapons. I needed to get out of their reach! Looking around frantically, I spotted a pile of wood leaning up against the side of the Quonset hut through a gap in the fence.
I turned and ran for it, sprinting as fast as I could on one hydro. It wasn’t quite fast enough the ghouls were gaining on me…
I reached the fence, jumped, caught the top with my hooves, and sacrificed momentum to sling myself up and over. I made it four steps before the ancient rotting cedar timbers shrieked, cracked, and groaned as the hoard splashed against it.
I spared a moment to glance over my shoulder. The ghouls which had hit the fence were being used as a ramp by the ones behind them! They were pouring over the fence like brahmin milk out of a bucket.
I put on every ounce of speed I could summon and raced for the wood pile. A few oil drums next to the woodpile provided me with an easy up. I clamored atop them, jumped onto the stacked firewood, and kicked the barrels over with my hind legs as I clamored up the wood.
Logs fell of the pile, the entire stack of wood shifted. Somehow, probably magically, I managed to keep my balance and race up the pile towards the hut’s roof as the pile mostly collapsed beneath me.
My forehooves touched the aging sheet-metal roof. I was safe! I just had to pull my—
Something bit into my left hind leg and wrenched me back down. For a moment, I hoped my armored sock would handle the bite, then I felt the sock slip down my leg. It was, after all, just a sock. I didn’t need to look to know I was doomed.
The swarm was on me before I knew it. Probably because as the first strip of flesh was ripped from my body my screams drowned out all conscious thought. The second was worse; by far, it was the worst pain I had felt in a long time. The way their teeth scraped against my armor. They way their decaying hooves slammed against me, threatening to rattle components loose, break solder-joints, and my broken diodes were points of screaming agony all down my left side.
The world started to fade, and I knew I would die here. My talisman would regenerate until its reserves of matter ran dry. My core would keep the ghouls on me. One day, a pony would find a rusted pile of armor plates, and the titanium/crystal skeleton, and wonder what kind of robot I was before tearing my corpse apart for caps at the scrap yard.
“NOOOOO!” I screeched around my pistol grip.
The world snapped back into focus. I fired my LAER. I heard a ghoul pop. Puss and necrotic blood splattered across my face.
I bit down on my pistol’s trigger. Green energy bolts flew every which way as I whipped my head around randomly, twisting and turning to get onto my hooves as I shot, not caring where the bolts went.
I was getting out of here, now! I needed to get up. Ferals are bad climbers. I needed another up!
I turned to start shooting a path to the old mechanic’s shop on the same lot as the hut. I shot left, right, and center, sprinting as I fired. I had no time to let my pistol recharge. I ran the reserve down and then fired every bolt as they generated. My LAER discharged nearly continuously, and screamed a few heat warnings at me through my link module.
I didn’t care.
While under the pile of ghouls, I had noticed these ferals were rail thin, bleeding from their skin, and had lost all color in their eyes. They were dying. Nearly dead. I was tasty rads and meat. Rads they needed desperately. They wouldn’t give up. They’d use every last ounce of energy they had to kill me and crack my core open.
I ran.
The mechanic’s shop didn’t have any way up that I could see.
I ran.
The swarm shrieked and howled at my tail.
They ran.
I caught a glimpse of myself in a somewhat shiny chrome mailbox as I ran into the street. I had an eye, a bit of fur around it, and one small strip of pelt around my saddlebag strap, and the fur under my socks. They’d torn me bare that quickly…
I ran.
I could hear the ghouls chasing me. Frenzied hooves thundering against ancient asphalt.
I ran.
I ran toward the ranch house on the opposite side of the street. I thought I could parkour up from a parked wagon onto the porch’s roof and—
Another impossibly large pack of ghouls surged out from around the house, heading right for me, drawn by the first’s shrieks and howls.
I started to cry in my remaining eye. I felt the other tear up as soon as my tear duct regrew.
I turned to move down the street, and I ran. I could feel my hydraulics starting to protest pushing them this hard without two working motors. I didn't have time for that. I had to get up! I had to get off the street.
I heard the two packs merge, their stamping hooves and howls melting together as the packs flowed into each other as they met in the middle of the street.
I wanted to look back and see if I had time to find an up, but I knew that would mean I wouldn’t find an up for certain.
I ran.
The ghoul’s shrieks sounded like they were coming right from the tip of my tail.
Then, suddenly, like a gift from Celestia, I saw a ladder leaning against a house with a mostly collapsed roof. A big stack of clay shingles lay at the base of the ladder, mostly broken.
I turned, and I ran.
I made it to the ladder and flew up it, pushing every ounce of power I could into my hydros, and even activating my emergency servos for a further boost.
The rungs flew under my hooves as I scrambled up the ladder, got onto the roof, and then kicked the ladder with my hind legs. I turned just in time to whip my tail out of the snapping jaws of a ghoul as the ladder toppled back onto the swarm of starving zombies below.
They screeched. They howled. They clawed at the rotting wall’s timbers. The house creaked, groaned, and swayed as they pounded at it... as yet more ferals came running towards the noise.
I remembered how they had made a ghoul-ramp to get over the fence. I wasn’t safe here. I had bought myself a minute, maybe two, at the most.
I let my hydros cool down for a moment while I tried to come up with a plan.
If I ran back out of town, the ghouls would follow me out, and on open ground, they were faster than me and I would be dead. My only option was to keep using vertical movement to my advantage. If I could jump from roof to roof, or at least, keep climbing roofs and making them try to get up them, I could eventually gain some ground, perhaps even lose them.
I turned and looked back the way I had come and found the road I had used to get into town. I could see it ran cleanly down the middle of town, and had an idea of where it would emerge on the other side.
I’d have to cut a bee-line for that point.
I ran across the roof, took aim at a dilapidated slanted-over woodshed, and jumped. I landed on its roof, one hoof punching through the rotting plywood. The ghouls heard the noise.
They ran.
I jumped.
I climbed over wagons, raced across a fallen street light, and scrambled up the side of a collapsing bookstore.
They ran.
I jumped between the roofs of two ranch houses, landed on an apartment building fire escape and slipped inside the large building.
It was full of ghouls! Ghouls as far as the eye could see. They filled every room, every corridor. If they hadn't been sleeping when I barged in, I would have been dragged under again.
I ran.
They ran too, and joined the others outside.
I raced up the fire escape, onto the apartment roof, and then down the side of a building which had collapsed into the apartment.
They swarmed around the building. Shrieking and howling as loud as ever. Maybe louder.
My hydros screamed at me, begging for mercy. Even being topped up on coolant couldn’t help if you were generating heat faster than it could be removed!
I looked back. I had made no ground at all. The apartment delay had helped things, but the ghouls were just too fast. I had a few seconds lead on the ever growing swarm of ravenous maws.
I sprinted down the side of the building, scrambled up the side of a dumpster and jumped up, catching the edge of a fast-food restaurants roof and hauled myself up.
The rooftop provided a view of a large open grassy area surrounded by a wide strip of road, with a fountain in the middle. A town square. It had to be.
The Town square made my already dire situation worse by containing yet more ghouls!
I felt a crushing despair grip me as I wondered if the entire bucking town had been turned into ghouls. Then, I saw evidence it may have actually done just that.
A HUGELY oversized cargo wagon was overturned on the far side of the square. A prewar one. Blue, gold, and red. Hippocampus Energy. One of their big-bulky hazardous waste transport wagons. A pile of dark-greenish-black rocks had flowed out from the top of the wagon when it had tipped over and split open.
The entire street surrounding town square was covered in a greasy black film. Industrial waste. Dried sludge from a mana-reactor. Nothing else looks quite like that.
They said it would take hundreds of years for the radiation in reactor waste to go away. Apparently, it was true.
The ghouls in the square were hunched over the rocks, moving slowly if at all, conserving energy. They'd fed off this waste for so long, and now there were only traces left. Whether the gardens had swept away almost all the filth, or they were so decayed when they fired that the gardens hadn't bothered, or the terraforming megaspell had a few blind spots in its targeting program.
Either way, I was doomed.
If the ghouls were used to feeding off the rocks which my instruments told me were putting out a tenth of what my core was, I was a big glowing beacon of food for them. They were used to looking for things far less bright than I. I couldn’t get away by running.
Not from ghouls who thought I was meat with a belly full of nice hot rocks. Not unless…
I winced. This. Would. Hurt. Bad.
I jumped off the roof and ran straight for the wagon. Ghouls screeched and shrieked at me. I shot every single one I could, blasting a path to the pile of reactor waste. I needed to look less like food.
I holstered my pistol, reached back, ripped off part of my pelt in my teeth, and flung it away from me as hard as I could. Then, I ripped off another, and another, and another.
The ghouls kept running towards me.
I kept skinning myself alive.
The pain was impossible to describe. Desperation pushed me past it. I had no other out. I had to not look like food!
I tore the last scrap of pelt from my frame and flung it aside just as I reached the pile of waste. The ghouls shrieks and howls suddenly turned into frenzied roars and frothing. I turned around, worried I’d only made them angry.
I had.
The swarm was fighting with each other over the scraps of my skin. Good.
I waited a moment to make sure none of the ferals cared about me anymore. They didn't seem to. The ferals had their meat.
I turned, jumped over the side of the wagon, and sprinted out of town, ripping every shred of flesh from my frame as it regrew, crying when I had eyes before I had to rip them off of my face.
As I ran out of Applewood and raced down the road south I couldn’t help but realize that Wander would have known about this feral ghoul town. About Applewood. She could have spared me this pain.
Wander, I’m so sorry… I didn’t mean to...
☢★★◯★★☢
I wasn’t able to use my landmarking technique as I ran south through the night. I ran until my body started throwing text alerts up into my vision demanding I stop immediately. I found a hole. I hid in it for the night and just cried, trying not to vomit up overheated coolant.
At least, I think that’s how my pressure release valve worked. I hoped that’s how it worked.
That was the worst feral attack I’d ever experienced. As soon as my body wasn’t screaming at me, I got out of my hole and jogged. Heading south. Heading away from Applewood.
I didn’t stop jogging until the sun came up. I only stopped then because the stresses on my healing talisman and what I’d forced myself to endure had the diodes in my left side screaming in agony. A dull ache no more, they made their state known by screaming, stabbing my insides, and seeming to shift and slide around.
I wasn’t a meat-zebra. I wasn’t supposed to have sloshy insides. It was psychologically distressing, on top of agonizing.
The best I could do was walk.
Walk straight down the road, ready to shoot anything that moved.
Straight down the road, well away from anything remotely big enough to hide a feral.
I kept walking until the sun started setting. The only reason I stopped was because of the sign. I’d been so terrified and checking my flanks and six so much I walked right into it. Nor had I noticed the small, sprawling little town the sign was for any time I’d crested the many hills I’d walked up and down that day.
Welcome to Suggerville!
Home of Equestria’s least expensive drawbridge.
“Heh…” I laughed, my ears laying back and my left eye widening. “Heh… hehehehehahahahaha! BUCK THAT!”
I turned and started to trot off the road to the east. I was going the buck around Feral Hell 2: Electric Booglaoo!
I made my way around the edge of the town, staying well away from the buildings, moving from bush to bush, rock to rock, and keeping low to the ground when I had no cover. I was going to make my way safely around this trap. I was going to survive. I was going to—
Run straight into a canal.
I didn’t fall into the 60-meter wide artificial river. No. I simply saw it from afar. I saw how it cut me off from safety like the vengeful horn of Celestia herself.
Sugarville was built on either side of the banks of an enormous river. I had no idea how far up river I’d need to walk to find a way to cross. It could be days. Or a week.
Sugarville had mentioned having a bridge.
NO!
NO TOWNS!
NEVER AGAIN!
I’LL CALL WANDER, AND HOMAGE, AND WE’LL LIVE IN THE MIDDLE OF THE BUCKING WOODS IN A BUCKING IGLOO!
"Gears, snap out of it!” Imaginary Dad shouted. "You have a package to deliver, young mare! They paid for postage! Are you going to let the Kingdom down?”
Dad’s ultimatum shook me out of my blind terror.
He was right.
I was a mail mare.
Not just that. I was a Royal Courier!
I had a package.
It needed delivering.
And by Celestia, I was the only mare around here qualified for the job.
“Be there acid rain, bloodice, Windigo, or ghoul, we will deliver the mail...” I muttered to myself to help steel my non-existent nerves.
I grit my teeth and turned to follow the canal into town.
"That’s my girl! You got this. One hoof at a time.”
Sugarville was quiet… Too quiet. But, by the time I’d moved through row after row of dilapidated, nearly identical traditional wattle and daub houses and returned to the main road, I was confident the town was deserted.
For starters, everything here had clearly been picked over. Most buildings showed signs of recent salvage work. Pulled nails scattered here and there. Patches of missing timbers which terminated in cut ends, not broken ones.
I also passed by a rum distillery. I’d peeked inside. All the brewing and distilling equipment was long, long gone. Ponies came here. Ponies worked here. They just didn’t live here.
That made a feral ghoul swarm unlikely… and they probably didn’t live here because a days’ walk up the road was actually hell.
Further hope of safety came to me as I reached the road and spotted hoof prints and wagon ruts in the dirt covering the road. More than just one set. Lots of them, old and new. A thing I should have been looking for back in hell.
Caravaners came through here! Not just one lost caravan from halfway across the continent. Lots of them. Regularly.
It. Was. Safe.
I hoped.
After a few more minutes of walking, I reached the drawbridge. It was one of the industrial kind meant for letting large boats pass under it. I fully believed it was the least expensive on in Equestria, as the sign had proclaimed.
The bridge had precisely one decorative feature. Four concrete pillars located at the corners of the hinges on either side of the bridge which had once been topped with lamps. The rest of the bridge was a flat bit of sheet metal, topped with wood, and some very, very insufficiently thick looking bits of square metal tubing welded into the approximation of a bridge.
It was in terrible shape when it had been new. Now it was in horrible... shape? Could this be adequately described as a ‘shape’ for a building to be in?
No. No it could not.
Fortunately, ponies had patched it up with materials gathered from the town itself. Including several large pillars which went down into the canal itself. The drawbridge bridge drew no more, it would seem.
I smiled in relief. I half expected to have to find six arbitrarily sized and inconveniently located gears, along with six fuses of a random proprietary make, and specifically a lever, not a stick, or a pipe, but an actual lever which is for some reason, detachable from the control panel, to be able to move the bridge.
"Sweetie… After the next delivery, please see a mechanic. I think you got knocked a little loopy by that Sentinel.”
That's… probably a good idea.
I looked across the bridge. Sixty meters. No cover. Not a so much as a tipped over trash can.
On the upside, that meant no feral ambush until I got to the other side of the bridge. On the downside, something about the big stretch of open territory, and all the tall buildings surrounding the canal made the fur on the back of my neck stand up.
Something wasn’t right here…
But I had a package to deliver.
I took a step forwards, and froze as I caught a faint whiff of tobacco. Laying on the bridge, not too far from me, was a cigarette butt. A new one. The end was still smoldering. Somepony had been here very, very recently!
Maybe they would be willing to travel with me. There was safety in numbers and I clearly had no idea how to avoid the dangers here, even if I was good at that back home.
On the other hoof… The general stink of the whole bridge situation became that much more potent.
I took a deep breath, readied my LAER just in case, and started to cross the bridge.
My hooves clicked on the old timbers, and tinked against the odd metal plate patching the deck as I trotted across the bridge. Slowly. One hoof at time. Ears up and alert, scanning for danger, just as Dad taught me.
As I reached the middle of the bridge, I winced, waiting for a sniper’s bullet to split my head.
Nothing happened.
As I reached the three quarters mark, I started to relax. I was just still worked up from the ghouls. I’d passed the obvious ambush spot, and nothing bad had happened. All I had to worry about now was the old auto-wagons rusting on the sides of the road on the far side of the bridge. If a bunch of puss-bleeding ferals didn’t explode out of them like clown cars when I got off the bridge, I’d be okay.
I trotted forwards, keeping my eyes on the wagons. They were the biggest threat. They obscured a lot of the sidewalks. There could be so many ghouls in them, under them, and behind them.
So many…
My left forehoof clicked against the metal hinge on the far side of the bridge. I was across… Now, to sneak past the wagon and—
A rifle cracked!
I, bucking, called it!
My left foreleg exploded in pain as a bullet sliced through it, punching cleanly through my light armor and cutting a hydraulic line. My still agonizingly painful diodes decided they would attempt to transcend their mortal forms and become elementals of pure pain.
They succeeded.
I fell forward, my mostly-useless leg folding under me as I couldn't keep it pressurized. The rifle cracked again, and I felt a bullet whizz over my head, then heard it thunk into the bridge, splintering wood.
The concrete pillar! Decorative, but still concrete!
I pushed myself up on my three working legs and limped to the pillar, taking shelter behind it just as a third bullet punched a hole through the bridge’s deck.
Dad! Help! How counter-snipe? I silently begged, knowing that at some point he’d taught me how to handle gunfights.
If I wasn’t in extreme pain, I’d probably not have to try so hard just to think about—
A chunk of concrete exploded above my head as the sniper tried to shoot me through my cover. He’d almost succeeded.
Makes sense. Cheapest bridge, cheapest concrete.
“Don’t listen to me, don’t think, do what I say as I say it.”
I nodded and took a deep breath to calm myself.
"First: Locate the sniper’s position. Listen to the shots and the sound of bullet impacts. Use them to draw a line to the sniper.”
I did my best to think back at the shots. Their direction, how they had hit and come and—
Another shot rang out, the bullet whistled past my ear, almost cutting a groove in it.
And there were two shooters! They were probably on the same building, but there had to be two.
I peeked out from behind cover, looking up where the bullet had come from, and there they were. Two stallions with high-powered hunting rifles perched atop a large balcony in front of a clothing store.
A pegasus and an earth pony. Both wearing the olive green vest of the Tainted.
Great! I was on the road they were hitting today!
”Second: Isolate the target. Use suppressing fire, or have your partner cut off escape routes.”
I couldn’t do any of that. But, I could return fire now that I knew where they were. I imagined the rules were different for counter sniping when you were the target rather than responding to a sniper as a SWAT pony.
I shifted position to take a shot at the sniper farthest from me while he reloaded his bolt action rifle and—
A third pony, a mare clad in remarkably new looking equestrian heavy infantry armor, jumped out from behind one of the auto-wagons. She’d been standing just behind the rear wheel base, making sure her hooves weren’t visible from the bridge.
I had just enough time to take note of her battle saddle’s large fuel-tank before the twin heavy-flamers on her flanks plunged me back into hell.
I shrieked, feeling every fleck of hide as it caught fire. Every little armor plate as it began to smoke. I could smell myself cooking even before my vision started to drown in heat warnings.
I fired my LAER into the fire. Once, twice, three times. The flame subsided. I felt the comparatively freeing breeze blow across my bare plates. The flamer-mare’s eyes widened as she saw my armored endoskeleton. She shrieked.
One of the snipers yelled something. I couldn’t hear him, my mind was still screaming in agony.
"BUCKING ANAL SEEPAGE ON A SANDWICH! KILL THE BASTARD BEFORE YOU BURN!”
Dad’s order snapped me out of it, and I fired everything I had at the flamer mare. My LAER struck her twice in the chest. Energy bolts crackled and sparked, sliding off her armor or scorching small pits into the energy-resistant plating.
No good, I needed something bet—
She opened up with her flamers once more. I screamed again. My clothing burst into flames, everything but my scarf and saddlebags were fully ablaze within seconds. Critical heat warnings began to scream in my vision and ears. This was it. I was dead.
"DON’T YOU DARE DIE UNTIL THAT PACKAGE IS DELIVERED, YOUNG LADY!”
I fired my eyelaser.
Something exploded, and even more fire washed over me in a single pulse. A wall of fire, scorching my armor pates black and triggering a thermal-shutdown warning. This one was audible.
“Gears! Stop what this instant and get your butt home! Honestly! If you want attention you don’t need to parboil your cpu!” Mom’s recorded voice scolded in my ears.
The fire vanished. I saw the blackened halves of the flamer-mare’s corpse. I’d nailed her fuel tank. That was lucky. Maybe I could—
“WERE OUT OF FIRE! KILL IT WITH BULLETS!” One of the snipers screamed in terror.
Rifles cracked, I felt a bullet punch through my briancase.
Thank Celestia that’s empty.
I knew I couldn’t aim my LAER up with three legs. Taking my only chance I dropped to the ground and bent to draw my pistol from its leg holster.
A bullet punched a crater into the asphalt in front of my nose.
My pistol came out of its holster.
A bullet put a second hole through my leg, thankfully hitting nothing new.
I fired a barrage of green bolts at the balcony, peppering it as best I could with only my neck to aim.
My systems were still blisteringly hot. I felt something beyond sluggish. My movements were glacial.
The first sniper would have survived if he hadn’t popped up to take a shot. My green bolt burnt a hole through his head, and the pegasus dropped, falling back down to where he had poped up form in the first place.
I missed the second sniper. He popped up, vaulted over the side of the balcony, dropped to the ground, drew a sawed off shotgun, and gave me both barrels.
I shrieked in agony as the buckshot thunked against my definitely-unhardened armor. It didn’t punch through but it hurt on the same scale as the constant pain in my diodes.
So much pain… So hot… can’t move… gonna die...
"PAIN IS WEAKNESS LEAVING THE BODY!” Dad bellowed in a commanding voice.
The bandit turned his head and yelled something. There were more. Even if I could move, there were more…
"STAND UP! THERE IS GLORY IN YOUR PAIN!”
Not a soldier, imaginary dad… sorry… for letting you down…
"YOUR WOUNDS MEAN NOTHING! STAND!”
The bandit drew two slugs. I could tell by the little stripes on the shell casings. This was it… I couldn’t stand up to a slug when my armor was new, and its temper had just been shot to Tartarus and back.
I guess I’ll get to see you now…
"YOU’RE LETTING THEM STEAL YOUR PACKAGE! STAND! FIGHT!”
I truly, honestly, couldn’t move.
"YOUR MOTHER NEEDS YOU!”
Something deep in me, deeper than I had reached for ages, snapped. It was a tiny, little, itty, bitty, speck of power, but it was pissed!
I turned my head and shot the bandit twice in the heart.
I turned over and pushed myself up. The little spark… my spiritual power. Neglected. Underutilized for so long. If I hadn’t focused so much on being a zebra, I could make myself work like I was new. Instead, even with all my will channeling my magic through my systems, I could barely stand.
I heard three voices speaking indistinctly. Hoof steps. Running. Three more. They were coming around the auto-wagon the flamer-mare had used for cover.
"MAKE THEM TREMBLE! VICTORY IS YOURS TO TAKE! FORWARD!”
I staggered forwards, moving to the side of the wagon, resting my right flank against it, pistol aimed high, LAER aimed at chest level.
The first came around the wagon. I fired, my LAER’s raw power at this range made his barrel pop like a meat balloon as he took the lightning bolt point-blank.
The second one stumbled over the corpse. I bent down and fired my pistol. Three bolts burned through his flak vest, and he fell atop his friend’s corpse.
“SHIT!” The third squeaked, skidding to a stop and pulling an impressively fast 180.
I staggered out of cover. He needed to die. He was going to move around to flank me and kill me. He needed to die.
The bandit sprinted across the street. I fired my LAER, sending three lightning bolts streaking after her long braided blond tail. None of them hit. Even with my magic bracing my foreleg, it wouldn’t move enough for me to aim properly.
I brought my pistol to bear on the retreating bandit and fired. She ducked, seemingly on instinct, and the bolt streaked over her head.
“I GIVE UP! I’M SORRY! DON’T KILL ME!” She screamed, throwing a combat knife and a pistol to the ground as she continued to run, vanishing into an alleyway.
Oh. Retreating.
I don’t have the energy to chase her…
”She may come back. Ears sharp. New priority, see if they had some duct tape, patch your hydraulic line before you run out of spirit-power, sweetie.”
Imaginary Dad has the best advice about being a ghost in a machine, somehow...
But, I could one-up it. I checked to make sure my Link Module was still working properly and able to access my Stilt Strider. Everything was green. Impressive, considering the Strider had definitely taken a fire bath just now.
The slender metal legs deployed just as I exhausted my meager supply of spiritual energy. I dangled limply from the pack, barely able to direct it towards the two bandits I had just shot.
It took me nearly ten minutes to check their packs for tape. Nothing. Not a single one of them had tape. In fact, not a one of them had sufficient supplies to last even a night out in the wilderness. I could believe the Tainted had a camp to the far north. They had to have a few ghoul members who would need food, and I swore those bandits had said something about a fort… but I wasn’t in a thinking mood.
All I knew is these ponies didn’t have any duct tape. They had guns though, so I took them. And their bullets. Those had to be worth selling, and I didn’t want the mare who got away to come back, pick up a high-powered rifle and go on a quest for revenge against me.
So, I collected every, single, weapon, the Tainted soldiers had on them.
While searching the sniper who had jumped down from the balcony, I did find something which, I felt, in a more stable mindset, would have worried me a lot more. A letter, containing orders.
I want the zebra taken out. She’s already done enough damage by delivering a few of those radios. Merrang’s crew completely dropped the ball by letting Lith’s messenger walk by them. They had her bound, we missed our only chance to stop the damage. Contain it, or it will be your head.
She took down one of our Ultra-Sentinels on her own, and somehow smuggled an energy weapon into Tenpony. Make no mistake, that mare isn’t a mail mare. She’s definitely Lith Special Forces. Our agents tell us she’s heading to Filly. Find a good spot along the road and take care of her.
Don’t make me send Gale to do the job. We can’t afford another Magebridge yet and every time we wake him up we risk blowing the entire operation.
G.C.
This was important. Letters are Important.
I tucked it into my saddlebag with the letters. I’d find some nice Tainted to deliver the orders to. You always deliver lost mail. It’s common court—
Wait. No. Bad Gears! Those were orders to kill me! The Tainted were after ME! What if they torched Magebridge to try to get rid of me?
“Shit…” I mumbled, unable to react any more than that.
The worst thing about this was that the letter hadn’t even been sealed with a single centimeter of duck tape. They’d used cheap wax. No. Not wax. Raw sap.
Savages!
I made my way up to the bandit who died on the balcony and collected his weapon. He had a medical kit on him. It had no duck tape, but I took it anyways. He also had a few strips of dried Rad Hog meat.
I ate them.
I could tell my healing talisman’s matter reserves were almost empty. I’d have to graze or something. How long had it been since I’d had to eat?
I frowned to myself. I don’t think that January first, 1970 is correct… Dad? Have I eaten since then?
"Yes, you most certainly have, dear. Please, find tape, fix yourself up, then find a mechanic.”
Maybe there’s some in the store?
"It’s worth a shot.”
I climbed down the storefront and just shot the window to break it and enter. I felt dumb, because once I was inside I saw the door next to the window was open. In my defense. I was almost dead… And I was probably still dying.
The store was a bust. Totally empty. Not even clothing racks were left. Just some wires and hooks too rusty to be worth salvaging hanging from the ceiling. Even the place where the store’s wooden counter had once been was just a bare spot on the floor. I wouldn't have known a counter had been there if not for the bare floorboards being a tiny bit less dark there than anywhere else in the store.
I was about to leave and check anywhere else when I saw a closed door at the back of the store. A closed door. Meaning it might not be looted.
I trotted towards it, taking note of a sign on the door which read:
Specialty Items. No foals!
Below that was a separate sign, this one had a pony’s signature on it. Not graffiti, an actual intentional signature. I couldn't read it, but the rest of the sign read:
This facility approved for sale of Type C and F restricted items by the MoI and MoM on 06/9/2069
I wasn’t sure what that meant, but I hoped it meant “this room contains your mom, her workshop, hugs, and a special somepony or three.”
I reached out and tried the door knob. Locked.
I shot the door knob until it was molten slag and pushed the door open.
I had no time for such obsolete and pretentious things as lockpicking. I had tape to find.
Celestia, my diodes… Why were they still killing me?
I looked through the open door, peering through the dimness. I frowned. “Oh.”
I’d just found the store’s erotic clothing section.
Boo! Not tape.
I looked down and blinked back tears. “Poop…”
"Hon, look up and to the left.”
I turned my head and saw a rack of black silk panties. For a minute, I had no idea why Imaginary Dad directed me to look at underwear, but then I saw it. Each pair came bundled with a roll of duct tape for reasons I couldn’t even begin to fathom!
They were the little tiny rolls of tape, not the big construction ones, but they were tape!
“YES!” I raced forward and snatched the first roll I could find.
I quickly dug my screwdriver out from my pack and began taking apart my leg to patch the hydraulic line. It was a long, tedious, and difficult job, but, just as the moon began to rise, I managed to get my hydro-line to stop leaking.
The patch even stood up to full pressurization! Well, as fully pressurized as I could make it, having lost a good amount of hydraulic fluid thanks to the cut line. Fortunately, I could move at a slow walking speed. Just fast enough to save my Strider’s battery for when I needed it for difficult terrain.
I did check the adult section to see if they happened to bundle ethylene glycol with socks, or some hydraulic fluid with the weirdly-big dog collars. After all, if they had bundled one kind of robot medical supply with fetish clothing, why not others?
Unfortunately, they had not.
They did have a lot of faded magazines, but I didn’t think micarta would be a good patch for the holes in my chassis, so I ignored them.
On the upside, I left the room with about thirty rolls of duct tape, a few pairs of hoofcuffs they were selling for Celestia knows why, a large irregularly shaped silicone rod that might be useful for patching a leak or plugging something, and one nice full body multi-piece outfit.
It consisted of thigh high boots with socks, some kind of skin tight vest thingy which appeared to adjust for maternity purposes, a little hood that could zip to cover the face (great for blizzards!), a short pleated skirt, a paler pink body glove which didn’t cover the flanks (for… reasons?), and some straps that looked like the fashion equivalent of tactical webbing. It was made from supple black leather trimmed with a lovely purple lace and matching purple cotton accessories, with decorative silver studs on the leather.
Well, Homage might like it, and it was exactly my size! I never find clothes my size, and romance sometimes required special clothing. Or, at least, so I’d been told.
I had no idea what the outfit was called, but it seemed special! And if Homage didn’t like it, I bet Wander would. If I ever saw her again. Talking with Homage made me realize I had felt the same way about Wander as I had Homage, but more so, because of all the time we’d spent together…
Though, if Wander had been here, I probably wouldn't have found the back room and gotten the outfit so… Mixed feelings there. Mostly bad.
There was no sense waiting around. I didn’t need to sleep. I needed to find help, and there might be some help in Fillydelphia.
I left the store, turned south, and walked down the road in the moonlight as quickly as my battered body would allow.
☢★★◯★★☢
Around noon the next day it started to rain. Normally I like the rain. Not today. I didn't have enough biomass to generate all of my skin. Of course my hurt leg was the one thing that didn’t get regenerated… And of course grass wouldn’t work. I’d have to find some meat somewhere.
The rain kept leaking into my leg and making the tape come off my broken line. It was on the fifth time today for patching it back up. I should have eaten half of a bandit… Maybe with some motor oil to get the gross meaty taste out of it.
I was making horrible progress. I could see Fillydelphia on the horizon, but it felt like I wasn't even moving.
Actually, it felt like I had been punched in the side by that Ultra-Sentinel again, if my side was made entirely of testicles. Only my desperate need for repairs and knowing I needed to deliver my packages kept me going through the pain.
Step. Sob. Step. Sob. Step. Sob.
That was life now. Cold, slimy, oily rain and diode pain as I hobbled towards a city I’d never reach.
Step. Sob. Step. Sob. Step. Sob.
Something was making an odd wooshy rushy noise. I decided not to look. It was just going to be more pain, right?
Step. Sob. Step. Sob. Step. Sob.
The sound got louder, and louder, and louder. I grit my teeth, knowing something horrible was about to happen.
Step. Sob. Step. Sob. Step. Sob.
Then, it hit me. The rain.
The oily drizzling down pore turned into a full-blown monsoon made from pure hatred and throwing down literal golf ball sized raindrops. For a moment I swore I’d just stepped into a lake, but no! There was actual air between some of the raindrops. Imagine that.
I only barely had time to appreciate this new level of suck the rain had aspired to before a wall of water twice my height smashed into me from the side, and I was swept away in a flash flood!
It felt like it literally came out of nowhere. It had to have! I was on level ground! There was no water anywhere! And the dirt was dirt! It should have absorbed all the rain.
And yet, I was tumbling head over hooves, smashing into rocks, logs, and floating debris inside a massive ball of water that just swept across the ground in a total buck you to physics, reason, logic, and common decency!
I slammed into something big, heavy and unyielding. I heard a crunch and all of my senses went offline. I knew I was awake still, thanks to one of mom’s recordings going off in my mind.
“Primary sensory relay is offline. Please stand by! Literally. Stand by. Do not move while systems reboot.”
Followed by a more angry-but caring-motherly. “What did you do, young lady!?”
Without the ability to tell time, everything seemed to last forever. Blackness. Nothing. Isolation. Darkness. That was my world for an eternity.
When the eternity was over, I was laying on my head and neck splattered against the side of an old train car. I whimpered and slowly picked myself up, whimpering as my vision flickered and went spotty.
I’d broken something VERY important… Mom was going to fix me, angrily bap my nose so hard it would bend, feel horrible about that, and then fix me again!
I wiped the tears and water out of my eyes with my good leg and sniffled before glaring up at the sky. Only one thing could have caused a flood like that… A weather machine.
“Well buck you too, Pip!” I screamed into the sky. “Homage and I didn’t even cuddle! I blew my one bucking chance! You didn’t have to try to drown me. By the way, I DON’T BREATHE!”
A warning popped up in my vision as my diagnostic system came back online. I was completely out of coolant.
“Shi…” I mumbled to myself, unable to finish swearing thanks to the absolute ball of misery I was at that moment.
I quickly checked my belongings. Fortunately, my packs enchantments had ensured everything stayed inside. I’d been worried the fire had destroyed the enchantments, but, ironically, the bags and my scarf were the only clothing I had which survived the ghouls, flamethrower, and the flood.
How the floodwaters removed what remained of my armored socks, I’ll never know.
I still had that outfit I picked up in the clothing shop, but I didn’t want to leak hydraulic fluid all over it. I wasn't putting it on until I was fixed. I had to wear something after all. Heartland ponies dressed. That was the custom.
When in Roam, do as Roamanes do. Figuring out how to put on my new outfit was a concern for later. Right now I had a new idiom to focus on, one I just came up with myself.
When waterlogged, burnt, and boiling yourself to death, proceed quickly and efficiently to the nearest mechanic.
I turned, oriented myself towards the city on the horizon, and limped my way towards it.
Step. Sob. Step. Sob. Step. Sob…